Tendai Musakwa Opinions Editor

Vassar students take pride in their well-rounded erudition: we all know that Africa is not a country, we know about Hutus and Tutsis, and that Nelson Mandela is the greatest African statesman alive. However, it seems that with regard to what many still consider the uncultured, disease-and-conflict-ridden blob called Africa, we have placed immense confidence in the impartiality of our media to give us accurate information. The truth, however, is that there are two sides to every story. As an international student, my experiences in Zimbabwe are very different from what is portrayed in our media. In an effort to show how Vassar students sometimes take information for granted, I will give my understanding of the events leading to the present political and economic turmoil. My views concerning what, in my opinion, are blatant lies peddled by the western propaganda machinery are very different from what is commonly portrayed in the media. This should lead students to question how much information they take for granted.

In 1999, after 20 years of independence, the Zimbabwean government embarked on land reform in an effort to redistribute wealth in Zimbabwe (at that time over 70 percent of the arable land on which Zimbabwe’s agricultural economy was based was in the hands of a white minority). After facing resistance from white farmers, the government decided to seize land compulsorily from them. This caused many conflicts between white farmers and the government and led to the forced eviction of farmers. Because of the bureaucratic nature of the land-redistribution process, veterans who had fought in Zimbabwe’s war of independence in 1980 decided to take matters into their own hands and invade white-owned farms.

In an ill-advised move to garner support for the 2000 parliamentary elections, President Robert Mugabe’s government, in light of serious competition from the newly formed opposition party, the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), ignored the farm invasions. This led to the war veterans demanding land and subsequently attacking white farmers, who retaliated by fighting back and defending their property. The situation received widespread media coverage, mostly going to the white farmers who had been injured and claimed that the government had committed acts of terror against them. The MDC then allied with the white farmers in order to gain publicity and started claiming that their own supporters were tortured and killed by the ruling party. The opposition party went on to call for sanctions on Zimbabwe in an effort to oust Mugabe and his government. This has lead the U.S. to “promote democracy” by imposing sanctions on Zimbabwe and making bodies like the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank do the same.

The New York Times, widely considered a reliable source of information, describes Zimbabwe as “a pariah state…and an outpost of tyranny” (11.12.06 editorial). This is because in Zimbabwe there are supposedly widespread human rights violations committed by a dictator, namely one Mugabe. The real situation in Zimbabwe is very different from this sort of image. Mugabe was re-elected in 2002 with a 56 percent majority by a democratic process ruled as free and fair by a group of observers from the African Union and the Southern African Development Community. It is hardly accurate to call Zimbabwe a pariah state either,: the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, in its last yearly summit on Nov. 16–Nov. 26, 2006, reaffirmed its commonality with Zimbabwe. The organization also called for other countries to extend solidarity to Zimbabwe in light of the illegal sanctions imposed by some western countries, including the United States (www.comesa.int).

Vassar’s chapter of Amnesty International perpetrates the misinformation about Zimbabwe that the American media promotes. Recently, this group put up a poster in the All-Campus Dining Center alleging human rights abuses in Zimbabwe, more specifically the torture of a man by the Zimbabwean government. Granted, the group probably gets this information from Amnesty International, but this, to me, does not make the information any more credible. My country has an effective criminal justice system and no one is above the law; government ministers, top cabinet officials and the former president have been tried and convicted in Zimbabwe. To allege that human rights abuses such as what the poster purported happen in Zimbabwe on a widescale basis is ludicrous and irresponsible reporting.

I urge Vassar students to become more skeptical of the information they receive. We have established particular media outlets such as The New York Times to be irrefutable sources of information. The problem with doing this is that if these news sources are biased in some way, then the information which the whole country receives is prejudiced. Media outlets more often than not get news from each other and do not take the effort to substantiate these pieces of information. If we as students choose to take information at face value, we have failed in one of the goals of a liberal arts education, which is to produce students who question the information they receive. We as Vassar students should be more critical of the information we receive from the media.

As analytical students, we should be more willing to question the reliability of our media in an effort to reach the truth. Just because news is printed in bold type or broadcasted in bright lights does not mean that it should be taken at face value. If more people were critical of the information they receive, perhaps the far-reaching impact of the media—to destroy or sustain whole nations—could be curbed and we would create a better world for everyone.